Tokyo Girl

People Who Eat Darkness: The True Story of a Young Woman Who Vanished From the Streets of Tokyo - and the Evil That Swallowed Her Up
Richard Lloyd Perry
True Crime

I love true crime books. When I first discovered Ann Rule (who I highly recommend, by the way), I spent the next year devouring all of her titles. So when I spotted the strange cover of this book and noticed it was about a young woman who vanishes in Tokyo, I knew I had to read it.

People Who Eat Darkness is the story of Lucie Blackman, a twenty-one year old British flight attendant who quits her job in the UK to go to Tokyo with her best friend and make money to pay off her debts. The two girls get jobs hostessing at a nightclub near their apartment. One day, Lucie tells her roommate she’s going to meet a man she met at the club. Lucie never comes home and it’s a race against time as the Japanese police, Lucie’s family, and her friends rush to find her before it’s too late. I’m gonna go ahead and spoil the plot and let you know that she is found, dismembered in a bathtub, and they catch the guy who did it.

This is a great book. Mr. Perry gets to know Lucie and her killer intimately, so by the time all the details come together, a vivid portrait of what really happened is clear. It’s a sad, sometimes disgusting tale, but Mr. Perry is such a good writer that I could not put this book down until the last page.

Anyone who enjoys true crime will like this book.

Getting to Know You

The Newlyweds
Nell Freudenberger
Fiction

What can I say about this book? It was good…sort of. It kept me entertained…sort of. I did finish it. I liked the main character. But did I actually enjoy the book? No.

The Newlyweds is the story of Amina, a twenty-four year old from Bangladesh who moves to Rochester, New York, after meeting her husband, George, online. She takes awhile to get used to the American way of things and saves money for her parents to move to New York to live with them. Then she discovers an unpleasant secret about George’s past and not long after that, is forced to go retrieve her parents, who have gotten into trouble. By the end of the book, Amina must choose between her new life and the life she could’ve had if she’d stayed in Bangladesh.

There were way too many instances of past tense in this book. I swear, Ms. Freudenberger used “had” about twenty times per page. It drove me nuts once I started noticing it (which was about one chapter in). But I gritted my teeth and kept going because the story interested me. Well, mostly it was Amina who interested me. Which brings me to my next point. The story was pretty much all told in Amina’s POV, so why wasn’t it in first person? Third person made me think we’d hear from other characters, but we didn’t. And don’t get me started on the last part of the book, where Amina suddenly thinks she’s in love with this guy she’s known since she was a kid. That came out of nowhere.

I guess I would recommend The Newlyweds. It’s not the best book I’ve ever read, but it kept me entertained. But be warned, it is long.

Everybody Wants to Rule the World

The Land of Decoration
Grace McCleen
Fiction

Wow. My mind is blown. This book is…I don’t even have words for it, actually.

The Land of Decoration is about ten year-old Judith. She lives in a small town in England with her father. She’s not friends with anyone at school because she and her father are part of this odd religious group that preaches how the end of the world is coming. Judith has created her own little Land of Decoration, a dollhouse of sorts modeled after what’s going to happen when the world ends. After reaching her breaking point with the taunts from children at school one day, she starts to hear God’s voice and realizes she has the power to control her destiny and everyone else’s.

This book has so many crazy twists and turns it made my head spin. First I thought Judith was just weird, and then I thought she had magical powers, then I thought she was mentally ill because she was talking to God and he was responding. Yet I was on the edge of my seat throughout every chapter, and I could not stop reading. Ms. McCleen is a great writer and I give her credit because if Judith wasn’t such a wonderful character, I definitely would not have kept reading.

The Land of Decoration is bizarre. In a good way. I highly recommend it to everyone.

Daddy Dearest

Outside the Lines
Amy Hatvany
Fiction

I loved this book. It’s all about love and family drama, my two favorite things.

Outside the Lines is the story of Eden and her father, David. David’s a mentally ill painter, struggling to keep his wife and daughter happy while battling his inner demons. After finding him on the bathroom floor, bleeding from the wrists, ten year-old Eden loses her father for good when her mom divorces him and he disappears from her life. Years later and now a successful chef, Eden sets out to find the father she’s been missing so terribly and help him get his life back on track. But does he want her help? You’ll have to read the book to find out.

All the characters were great. Eden and David, especially. I was impressed with how sympathetic and real Ms. Hatvany made David. It can’t be easy to write from the viewpoint of a mentally ill person. Usually first person/third person POV switches annoy me, but not this time. Maybe because I found the plot so interesting. I was a little afraid the book would have a dark ending, but it didn’t. It’s not a puppies-and-rainbows ending, either. Just a good, satisfying conclusion to Eden and David’s story.

Outside the Lines is a great book and I would recommend it to everyone.

Sister Sister

The Gilly Salt Sisters
Tiffany Baker
Fiction

I’m a sucker for any book about sisters (because I know first-hand that there is nothing more strange or wonderful than the relationship between two sisters), so when I read this book’s intriguing description, I put it in my bag. The cool cover didn’t hurt, either.

The Gilly Salt Sisters is about Jo and Claire, two sisters who’ve grown up in a small town, working the salt marshes on their mother’s land. Claire’s always hated the salt while Jo has always known it’s her destiny, but the discovery of one scandalous letter sets into motion a chain of events that changes everything for both of them. Years later, Claire and Jo are estranged while Jo continues to work the struggling salt farm and Claire relishes her role as first lady of the town thanks to her marriage to Jo’s childhood sweetheart, Whit. Then the teenage daughter of the new diner’s owner finds herself drawn into Whit, Jo, and Claire’s strange world and everyone’s lives are thrown into turmoil again.

Whew. That’s a lot of description without giving too much away. I really enjoyed Claire and Jo, and I especially loved their relationship. They were both right and both wrong; both had their faults and their sympathetic sides. My only minor complaint would be that I wanted the resolution of Claire’s love story. By the end of the book, it appeared that Claire and Ethan were finished with each other, and then the next chapter skips forward in time and they’re married! What the hell, Ms. Baker. There’s nothing better than the moment two people realize they can’t live without each other.

Despite that minor complaint, The Gilly Salt Sisters is a great book full of twists and turns and wonderful characters. I recommend it to everyone.

This Land is Our Land

Some of My Best Friends Are Black: The Strange Story of Integration in America
Tanner Colby
History

I wasn’t sure what to expect when I picked this book up. All I knew was that it had gotten good reviews and that’s enough for me. I did not think I would be sucked in to Mr. Colby’s world so viciously.

Some of My Best Friends Are Black is mostly history with a little bit of memoir thrown in. The book begins with the author realizing he has no black friends and, considering he grew up in the South, wonders why that is. He sets out to find out and learn about the sordid and sometimes surprising history of segregation in the good ol’ U S of A.

Mr. Colby is an excellent writer and highlights some complex issues still facing America today. Jim Crow laws are long gone, so why are some areas still so segregated? Why are some not? And how did they all get this way? I won’t answer these questions because I want you to read the book to find out.

Some of My Best Friends Are Black is an important book for everyone to read, no matter what color your skin is.

Pay Up

The Cost of Hope: The Story of a Marriage, a Family, and the Quest for Life
Amanda Bennett
Memoir

I really need to stop reading non-fiction books about people dying. They are just so damn depressing. But this one got such good reviews that I couldn’t help picking it up. Also, since my dad has been in the hospital recently, I was interested in her experience dealing with hospital bills (which are ridiculous, by the way).

The Cost of Hope is about Amanda, a reporter who meets her soul mate Terence, while on assignment in Beijing in 1983. The story of their courtship is hilarious and sweet, and eventually they end up married with two kids, moving around the country wherever Amanda’s job takes them. They are living in Oregon when doctors discover that Terence has cancer. And not just any cancer, a rare, aggressive form that the medical community knows next to nothing about. For the next few years, they do anything and everything they can to try to fight it, but (spoiler alert) Terence does eventually die.

Ms. Bennett is a great storyteller. This memoir flowed so easily I read almost the entire thing in one night. So what is the cost of hope? She doesn’t have a clear, easy answer. Yes, hospital billing systems are confusing and insane, but medicine keeps hope alive when we need it most. It’s jaw-dropping how the simplest test can cost thousands of dollars. Are these tests worth it? Maybe, maybe not. Then there's the crazy world of insurance, which Ms. Bennett also delves into. Navigating the US medical system is not for the faint at heart, that’s the lesson I took away from this book.

I would recommend The Cost of Hope to everyone. Some tears might flow, but you will learn a lot, too.

Wedding Bell Blues

Seating Arrangements
Maggie Shipstead
Fiction

This was another book that I liked but I didn’t like. I feel like I read more of those kind than ones that I just love. Which is sad because I would definitely prefer to read books I love.

Seating Arrangements is the story of one weekend on a New England island. Family and friends father for the wedding of Daphne Van Meter, including her father, mother, sister, aunt, best friends, and many others. We get a lot of different POVs, but we hear from Winn (the father) and Livia (the sister) more than most.

Unfortunately, Winn is a bit of a tool. Even though all the characters were pretty unlikeable, if I had to choose, Livia was probably my favorite. When she wasn't pissing me off, that is. I’m still confused as to why the book is called Seating Arrangements when the seating arrangements don’t have any significant contribution to any part of the story. Someone totally missed the boat on the title (hopefully not the author).

Ms. Shipstead is a good writer and certain bits of dialogue would catch me off guard and I’d find myself smiling or laughing. I just wish there was more dialogue because Winn was especially internal and I found myself skimming his sections a lot due to all the really long paragraphs of descriptions.

But my complaints are relatively minor and besides the anti-climactic ending, I did enjoy most of the book. I would recommend it for a beach or pool read.

Home Sweet Home

If Walls Could Talk: An Intimate History of the Home
Lucy Worsley
History

The first time I read a review of this book, I thought, what could possibly be so entertaining about the history of homes? Then I realized the author would probably delve into how bedrooms evolved, how toilets came to be inside instead of out, and why people resisted showers for so long. All burning questions I’ve been dying to know the answers to for awhile and boy, did I get my answers.

In If Walls Could Talk, popular British historian Lucy Worsley tackles the bedroom, bathroom, living room, and kitchen. She then breaks each room down into even more specific topics, such as the history of sleep, brushing teeth, and all about clutter, to name a few. There was not one boring chapter in this book, and I found Ms. Worsley a delightful and informative guide.

If you like history books full of little-known facts, If Walls Could Talk is for you. It’s for everyone, actually. I can’t think of anyone who wouldn’t enjoy it.

RSVP

The Invitation
Anne Cherian
Fiction

This book is a quick read. In some ways that’s a good thing, in other ways, it’s a bad thing.

The Invitation is about a group of friends who reunite for one of their sons’ graduation from MIT. We follow Frances, Jay, Lali, and Vik, who all became friends during graduate school at UCLA. Now their lives have taken them on separate paths but there are surprises in store when they come together the night of the party.

All the characters were interesting enough, but I found the ending to be a bit of a letdown. What happened was slightly shocking, but I wanted more drama. I mean, these people had all sorts of dirty little secrets but not many of them really came out. Also, there was way too much back story. Not enough of the action took place in the present. I hate flashbacks, so I had to grit my teeth to get through a lot of this novel.

I would recommend this book as long as you’re okay with tons of exposition.

The Beat Does Not Go On

It's time for another edition of Why I Couldn't Read This Book. We have three contenders today, so let's take a look at them all, shall we?

Derby Day
D.J. Taylor
Fiction

This book was nominated for the Man Booker Prize, apparently. Lord help us all. It was boring. Very, very boring. And all of the characters were Mr. This and Mrs. That. No one was called by their first name. Nothing takes me out of a book faster than seeing Mr. This over and over again on the page. How can I relate to a character when the tone is so formal? I can't, which is why I set this one down after four chapters.

The Red House
Mark Haddon
Fiction

I loved The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night. It was one of those books where I wasn't sure at first but then I kept reading and I ended up loving it. So I gave Mr. Haddon the benefit of the doubt and picked up his latest. Then I started reading and quickly realized all the dialogue was italicized. No quote tags. Just italics. You know how much I hate italics. You know how much I hate authors who try to be all stylish and "different" by not using quote marks. Guess what, stupid authors? When I see you trying to reinvent the standard novel form, it makes me hate you. And it makes me put down your book.

The Water Children
Anne Berry
Fiction

The cover's cool. The story idea, a book about four children, all of whom have issues with water, is an interesting one. Too bad it was so dull. Also, the first chapter starts with a young boy not watching his sister and her, you guessed it, drowning. Way too dark for me. I managed to get through to the next child but I couldn't shake the feeling that this novel would not have many upper moments, so off to the bottom of my stack of books it went.

Stranger Danger

Caring Is Creepy
David Zimmerman
Fiction

First of all, I love the title of this book because it’s the title of my favorite song by The Shins. Second of all, I…really don’t know what to say about this book other than to read it is to believe it.

Caring is Creepy stars fifteen year-old Lynn Marie, who is just trying to make it through another boring summer in rural Georgia. She and her friend Dani start chatting online with random people and that’s when Lynn Marie meets Logan, an older man in the Army. At the same time, her mom’s creepy on again/off again boyfriend, Hayes, has started getting threatening phone calls and shows up at the house at odd hours. Everything comes to a head when Logan runs away and comes to stay with her and the thugs Hayes crossed come looking for him.

This book was weird. Every time I thought I knew where it was going, the plot changed directions. The end was a little too convoluted for me; so much was happening it made my head spin. But the writing was good and Lynn Marie is a great character.

I’d recommend this book for the WTF factor and because the dialogue is so good.

Thicker Than Water

Hand Me Down
Melanie Thorne
Fiction

Wow, this book was depressing. I knew it would be and I requested it at the library anyway. This is what happens when you read too many book reviews and get sucked in by the enthusiasm.

Hand Me Down is the story of fourteen year-old Liz (damn, I just checked the book jacket to look up her age and realized I went through the whole story thinking she was sixteen) who lives with her mom and younger sister. Their dad is an alcoholic who almost killed them a few times and mom’s married to a sleazeball who likes to fondle Liz when mom isn’t looking. All this gets to be too much for Liz and eventually she’s sent to Utah to live with her aunt Tammy. Things are starting to look up, but Liz can’t stop worrying about her sister. A dramatic visit home finally pushes everyone to the breaking point.

Like I’ve mentioned before, I hate books about abuse and neglect. But I decided to give this one a try, hoping maybe it wouldn’t be too graphic or horrible. And it wasn’t, thankfully. I mean, yes, horrible things happen and awful people abound, but the bright spot is Liz. She’s a great character. Everyone else around her sucks, but Liz is awesome. You really root for her and when she finally landed in a real, loving home at the end, I breathed a sigh of sweet relief. You will, too.

I would recommend this book to everyone.   

Bright Lights Big City

The Next Best Thing
Jennifer Weiner
Fiction

Much as I like Jennifer Weiner, a lot of times I finish her books with a bad taste in my mouth. This was one of those times.

The Next Big Thing is all about Ruthie, a twenty-eight year old who moved to Los Angeles with her grandmother a few years ago and now is all set for the sitcom she created (titled The Next Best Thing) to go into production. But putting together a TV show is one thing, and keeping it on the air is another. As Ruthie struggles to deal with interfering producers and ego-centric stars, she realizes Hollywood is changing her—and not for the better.

I have no problem with Ms. Weiner’s characters. She always creates good, complex characters. But the only thing I was interested in was the love story between Ruthie and one of her production partners who is in a wheelchair. That kept me reading. Nothing else. Which is weird, considering for the longest time when I was in high school and college my dream was to write for TV. But the behind-the-scenes stuff in The Next Best Thing was kind of boring. I found myself skimming a lot. Ms. Weiner also tends to go on and on about really lame details. She used up three whole pages to describe Ruthie walking through a house. As long as it has a ceiling and floors, I really don’t care what the staircases look like and what pictures are on the wall.

I guess I would recommend this book if you like Jennifer Weiner or if you’re interested in reading a good romance. Everyone else should avoid this book at all costs.

Your Love is My Drug

Sweet Talk
Julie Garwood
Romance

I adore Julie Garwood. She was the first romance author I fell in love with (pun intended). The Bride is still one of my top five, all-time favorite romance novels ever. So I was quite disappointed when she started writing thriller/adventure novels instead of just plain romance. But that hasn’t stopped me from picking up a book with her name on it.

In Sweet Talk, we meet Olivia, who works for the IRS. She’s also trying to take down her father, who she knows has been stealing money from his clients and own family. Ever since her childhood battle with cancer, Olivia’s used to being strong and taking care of things by herself. But when a potential job interview goes bad, Grayson walks into her life. He works for the FBI and finds himself protecting Olivia far more than is necessary. The sparks fly between the two and they must work together to figure out why someone is trying to kill Olivia while at the same time nailing her father.

I really liked this one because there was a good amount of intrigue and romance. Plus I loved all the family drama. The best conflict comes from familial relations, I think. Not only did I enjoy Olivia and Grayson’s love story, but I also liked how by the end of the novel, Olivia’s awful family (parents and sister) stayed awful. There was no last-minute turn around for them, no sudden change of heart. They were heinous from beginning to end. While sad on one hand, I liked the realism of it on the other.

Ms. Garwood creates great characters and wonderful dialogue. I highly recommend all her books, especially her earlier ones (pick up The Bride, The Gift, and The Wedding today, if you haven’t read them).

Head of the Class

The Red Book
Deborah Copaken Kogan
Fiction

I hated this book, but I kept reading it until the very bitter end. There’s a term most TV viewers know called hate watching. This is when you watch a show, but you hate it. I think that term applies to this book. I read it, but I hated it.

I’ll give a quick summary and then jump right into the top five things I hated about The Red Book. For their 25-year reunion at Harvard, four girlfriends reunite with their families and old drama resurfaces.

Thing #1 I hated: Long paragraphs. Oh my god, were the paragraphs long. And the worst part was, some of them weren’t even descriptions. Quite a few were supposed to be dialogue. Nobody can talk that long without taking a break or someone interrupting them. Nobody.

Thing #2 I hated: Breaks. Two people would be having a conversation. Person A would say something or ask a question. Person B would ruminate about something else entirely or remember a certain memory and this would go on for a page or two. Then Person B would finally respond to Person A. What the effing hell? Have you ever been talking to someone, said something, then let the conversation dangle for five minutes while you mused about a completely unrelated topic? Didn’t think so.

Thing #3 I hated: Characters. I did not like one single character in this book. I take that back, I liked some of the kids. But they don’t really count. All of the main adult characters were pretty heinous, or, if I did like them, at some point, I discovered a secret about them that made me hate them.

Thing #4 I hated: Texts. At a critical spot in the book, two characters have an extremely long text conversation (that should’ve been a face-to-face dialogue conversation). Using short-cut slang such as ‘u’ and not capitalizing. Which is fine in real life. In a book, however, it sucks to read. Made my head ache.

Thing #5 I hated: One of the characters dies at the end, and of course, it ended up being the only adult character I didn't want to throw off a bridge. What crap. Total and utter crap.

 Do not read this book, I beg you. It will just make you angry.

Sins of the Mother

The Reeducation of Cherry Truong
Aimee Phan
Fiction

My 100th post! This is so exciting. I wish I had something special to write or post, but I don't. Too busy reading, you know. And I hope I'll never be too busy not to read.

I almost put this book down permanently a few times, but now I’m glad I stuck with it until the end because it was pretty good.

The Reeducation of Cherry Truong (that’s quite a mouthful, isn’t it?) is about a woman named Cherry who lives with her brother and parents in California. When her brother is sent back to Vietnam after Cherry has an accident, she follows him and finally learns more about her sordid family history. This book is supposed to be about Cherry but we actually hear from a lot of different family members, so I thought the title was a little off.

I was also annoyed by how many characters I had to remember. I suppose I should’ve realized what I was in for when I saw the family tree at the beginning of the book. Still, it got old reading someone’s name and wondering who they were and how they related to everyone else. I wish I could say I had every person and their connection figured out by the end of the book, but that would be a lie.

This novel is a juicy read and Ms. Phan is a great writer. Anyone who loves books about family history and scandals will love The Reeducation of Cherry Truong.

Let The Sunshine In

A Safeway in Arizona: What the Gabrielle Giffords Shooting Tells Us About the Grand Canyon State and Life in America
Tom Zoellner
Political/History

I’m a born and raised Arizonan, which is pretty strange because it’s actually quite rare these days to find someone living here who was born here. Initially, I wasn’t going to read this book, mainly because I really didn’t think there was much to say about the tragic shooting in Tucson. But then I read the rest of the title and thought, huh, I’d like to know what the shooting tells us about my state. Nothing good, as you can probably guess.

Mr. Zoellner is a newspaper writer who grew up in Tucson and a friend of Gabrielle Giffords, so the subject of this book hit home for him. He weaves the story of everything leading up to the shooting between hot-button topics such as gun control and illegal immigration. I guess I’ve been living in the dark because there are quite a few things I didn’t know about my state. Honestly, if I read this and I was living somewhere else, no way would I want to move to AZ. This book certainly doesn’t do much for the Arizona tourism industry.

A Safeway in Arizona is a fascinating book, especially if you live here. If you don’t, read it anyway because Mr. Zoellner makes a lot of good points about the sorry state of Arizona, and most of the US, today.

Save the Drama For Your Mama

A Surrey State of Affairs
Ceri Radford
Fiction

Oh my god, this book is hilarious. I read it in one day, that’s how good it is.

A Surrey State of Affairs begins with Constance Harding, an Englishwoman in her fifties who lives near Surrey, trying out the first entry of her new blog. The story’s in diary format, starting in January and ending in December. And what a year it is for Constance. So many things happen in her life I can’t even begin to describe them all, but here’s a sampler: son who won’t find a girlfriend, daughter who’s keeping some really big secrets, and a husband who’s keeping an even bigger secret than she could ever imagine. Not to mention all of Constance’s drama with her neighbors, friends, and fellow towns people.

Constance is just a delightful character. Several of her observations made me smile, a few actually made me laugh out loud. She’s not perfect and her stubbornness is frustrating at times, but who wants a perfect character? Not me. I’m also not usually a fan of the diary-format books, but I make an exception for this one, and you should, too.

Everyone should read this book. Just don’t drink anything while you are, because I guarantee liquid will come shooting out of your nose.

As The Worlds Turn

Other Waters
Eleni N. Gage
Fiction

Anyone else sad about the state of daytime soaps these days? I used to watch As The World Turns, Guiding Light, and All My Children. I used to want to write for them all one day. And now they’re all gone. It’s so depressing.

Other Waters is about Maya, a woman torn between two worlds. She’s Indian and lives in New York, working as a successful psychiatric resident. But seven years into her relationship with her white boyfriend, she’s still unable to tell her parents she loves someone outside their culture. Then her grandmother dies and someone puts a curse on the family. Bad things start happening to the people Maya loves, and when she travels to India for a wedding, she realizes just how divided between her two lives she really is.

I enjoyed this book. It didn’t draw me in as much as I would’ve liked, but Maya was an interesting character, as well as all her friends and family. There were way too many paragraphs of summary, though. I did a lot of skimming. I was also surprised by the fact that I didn’t mind the end. Usually in single woman stories, the protagonist ends up finding the guy who looks to be her soul mate by the end. But Maya didn’t. And I was actually okay with that.

I would recommend Other Waters, especially to anyone torn between two cultures.

The Voice

Jasmine Nights
Julia Gregson
Fiction

Sometimes it’s really hard thinking up blog post titles. Usually they pop into my head after I close the book, but sometimes, like with this book, I just could not think of a clever title. The next one will be better, I promise.

Jasmine Nights is the story of Saba and Dom. Saba lives in Wales and loves to sing, but her family disapproves. When she’s offered a job singing to wounded soldiers, she accepts and meets Dom, a fighter pilot, who is recovering from a copter crash in a hospital. He’s instantly smitten and eventually tracks her down in Egypt where they start a love affair. But Saba has secrets, and lies and misunderstandings eventually tear Saba and Dom apart. Will they find their way back to one another? I’m going to spoil this review and tell you that yes, they do, because if they didn’t, I sure as hell would be ranting about it.

Ms. Gregson is a good writer and she gives enough detail without giving too much detail. Her characters are well-rounded characters and the plot of this book was quite interesting. It wasn’t a can’t-put-down novel, but I still enjoyed it.

I would recommend this book, especially if you liked her other best-seller, East of the Sun (which I have not read but heard a lot of good things about).

You Should Be Dancing

The Master's Muse
Valery O'Connor
Fiction

Time for another bad review. I didn't even get halfway through this book. And it's about ballet and romance. Two things I love.

The Master's Muse should've been a good book. You have Tanny, a talented ballerina, who falls in love with George, the older director of New York City Ballet. Everything's fine and dandy until Tanny comes down with polio and can't dance anymore. Now she feels like a failure and thinks she's losing George (she's already wife number five). Lots of conflict and juicy stuff to dive into, right? Except something's missing. I don't know what.

Tanny's kind of boring. Her and George's marriage is boring. We only get a brief overview of how they came to fall in love. I want details. That's the best part of a love story, for god's sake. Seeing how and why two people fall in love.

I wish I knew why I found this book so boring but I can't put my figure on it. If you really want to read about ballet dancers and falling in love, there's got to be better novels out there about it than this one.

This Is How We Do It

Ethical Chic: The Inside Story of the Companies We Think We Love
Fran Hawthorne
Business

I’ll be honest, I was a little afraid to read this book. I still hate hearing that L'oreal tests on animals (I love their face wash and eyeshadows so much) and I did not want to know about another company I liked having horrible ethical standards. But this book wasn’t that bad, actually. By that I mean it was good and informative and definitely opened my eyes about certain things.

In Ethical Chic, Ms. Hawthorne tackles six popular companies and investigates how they measure up when it comes to being green, treating employees well, how and if they use animals, and how the company deals with the public (open or secretive). This book is short and sweet—well, not so sweet if you’re a lover of American Apparel or Apple. To be fair, she has negative reports about all the companies but there are upsides as well. I was most disappointed to read that my beloved Trader Joe’s is owned by a giant conglomerate and that they are not as green and special as they claim they are.

Everyone should read this book and start their own investigations on the companies they love. You might not like what you find.

Dear Diary

Mrs. Robinson’s Disgrace: The Private Diary of a Victorian Lady
Kate Summerscale
History

I opened this book thinking it was fiction and then I was surprised to realize it’s actually non-fiction. Ooops! That’s okay, though. I liked the author’s last book, The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher, so I figured this one would be good, too. Sadly, I was only half-right.

Mrs. Robinson’s Disgrace tells the sordid tale of Isabella Robinson, who marries Henry Robinson after she is widowed. Unfortunately, the marriage is not a love match and Henry pretty much ignores her. So, in her diary, Isabella records all the interactions she has with various men, most of whom she develops crushes on. One in particular she begins an affair with and fills her journal with romantic ramblings and longings for her love. Then her husband finds the diary and demands a divorce (this is back in the 1850’s) and they must go to court where her scandalous entries are shared with the world.

This is all sounds interesting, doesn’t it? Too bad it’s not. Well, the first part is, where juicy excerpts of Isabella’s diary are quoted verbatim and Ms. Summerscale fills in the blanks. But then we get into the second half, the trial, and it gets kind of boring. I dislike trials in books to begin with, and witnessing all the odds and ends of a Victorian trial isn’t much better. The story limps along to a conclusion when the trial ends, and by that point, I was ready for the book to be over.

Ms. Summerscale is a good writer and the topic is interesting, but I just couldn’t get into Mrs. Robinson’s Disgrace as much as I would have preferred. Oh, well. It’s a short book. And you can always skim like I did.

Walk This Way

Women From the Ankle Down: The Story of Shoes and How They Define Us
Rachelle Bergstein
History

What woman doesn’t love shoes? Okay, that’s a bit of a stereotype, but pretty much every female I know gets a sparkle in their eye when they walk into a shoe store. I know I do (DSW, how I love you). So when I saw this book about the history of shoes and women, I thought it might be interesting. And I was right! I love being right.

Rachelle Bergstein tackles one specific shoe per chapter, starting with the wartime wedge circa 1900-1938 and ending with ruby slippers (2000-present). I was slightly skeptical about how good this book could be because as much as I love shoes, the best part is being able to see them. But I must give Ms. Bergstein credit because I ended up reading this in one day. All the Hollywood shoe anecdotes were great, as were the stories of how some of the most famous shoes in the world came to be (the story of Mary Janes I found particularly fascinating).

Women From the Ankle Down is a quick, easy read that any shoe lover will enjoy.

In Too Deep

Swim: Why We Love the Water
Lynn Sherr
History

I figured this was an appropriate book to read right now since the Olympics are going on (and because I’m the future Mrs. Michael Phelps). I’ve always loved swimming, especially in the hot Arizona summers, so I was intrigued to read about its history and Lynn Sherr’s own personal triumph of swimming across the Hellespont.

Putting aside my misgivings about how boring this book might be, I was pleasantly surprised by how interesting it was. Ms. Sherr discusses how long the sport of swimming has been around (there are hieroglyphics in Egypt that depict it) and she even gets into the art of the backstroke and butterfly. There’s also a section on why African-Americans aren’t as into swimming (apparently, there were a lot of segregated pools back in the day and though progress has been made on that front, today African-American women hate to get their hair wet). It’s a short book, too, so it makes for a quick read.

Anyone who’s interested in swimming will enjoy this book. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to slip on my swimsuit and jump into the pool.

Expect the Unexpected

A Gift For My Sister
Ann Pearlman
Fiction

I cried more than once during this book. A general rule of mine is that I try not to read books that are going to make me cry because I hate being sad. But the flip side to that is that I cry so rarely that when a book does manage to make me tear up, I know it’s a good one.

A Gift For My Sister is about Sky and Tara, two half sisters who have always been at odds with each other. Now, though, Tara is a singer in a popular rap group and Sky works as a lawyer part time and takes care of her husband and young daughter. Then Sky’s husband abruptly dies. Crying moment number one. Tara must help pick up the pieces of her older sister’s life all the while struggling with insecurities in her relationship with her boyfriend. Many more crying moments follow, as you can imagine. I was horrified when Sky’s husband died because I was so not expecting that and I could tell he was going to and I kept praying that I was wrong (the description of the book on the jacket gives the reader no clue about this tragic turn of events).

I loved all the characters and the dialogue was great. My only tiny problem would be that I think the book should end earlier than it does. The last few chapters seem unnecessary. But the relationship between Tara and Sky is the real star of the book. The horrific and wonderful sisterly moments are amazing and so real, I was actually shocked when I read the acknowledgements section and found out Ms. Pearlman doesn’t even have a sister!

I would recommend this great book to everyone, not just sisters.

I Want Candy

Sweet Tooth: The Bittersweet History of Candy
Kate Hopkins
History

I am 28 years old and I love candy. There, I said it. Candy is supposed to be loved by children, not adults, but I am not ashamed to admit that I still glance longingly at Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, Milkyway bars, and Sour Patch Kids. Of course, now that I am an adult I know that eating candy for every meal is not a good idea, so I’ve scaled back on how much I consume quite a bit. But my love for candy has never faded. So you can imagine how much my candy craving started spiraling out of control while reading this book.

In the beginning of Sweet Tooth, Kate Hopkins is pondering why she loves candy so much when she decides it’s time to look more deeply into the history of her favorite food. She picks several locales to go visit and get more information on how candy came to be so popular. She visits Italy, Scotland, England and then finally comes back to the US. I especially enjoyed her thoughts and descriptions of candy in Europe because I have found that candy over there is so much better than the crap we have here.

Ms. Hopkins combines a good amount of history and humor, and her writing style goes down a treat (pun intended). I especially enjoyed the little sidebars where she gives more history and info on specific treats such licorice (yuck) and candy corn (yum!).

If you’re a sweet freak you’ll love this book but be aware that you will want to go out and raid the grocery store candy aisle when you are finished.

Fight to the Finish

In Spite of Everything
Susan Gregory Thomas
Memoir

Why do I like reading memoirs about marriage so much when I’m not married, much less dating anyone? It’s one of life’s great mysteries, I guess.

In Spite of Everything is about Ms. Gregory Thomas, who, after going through a traumatizing time when her own parents divorced, vows that she will never divorce. And then, ten years into her marriage, realizes she cannot stay in her marriage. It’s an interesting premise, but unfortunately, that wasn’t enough to sustain the book.

I just could not get into this. I wanted to, and I really loved the descriptions of when exactly the faults in the relationship started (they were there right from the beginning, apparently, but neither the author nor her husband wanted to see them). The writing was good, a little too flowy and dense at times, though. This would be a better review if I could put my finger on why I didn’t like In Spite of Everything. I guess in spite of everything, I just can’t say (sorry, couldn’t resist).

Would I recommend this book? I’m not sure. Like I said, the subject’s fascinating and the writing is adequate. It was just missing something. So, no. I would not recommend this book. There are better memoirs out there about marriages unraveling.

Let's Get Physical

Drop Dead Healthy: One Man’s Humble Quest for Bodily Perfection
A.J. Jacobs
Health/Memoir

I meant to get around to reading Mr. Jacobs’ other two books, The Year of Living Biblically and The Know-It-All, but I decided this one sounded much more interesting, so I picked it up instead.

For the past few years, I’ve been trying to be healthier. I’ve been exercising on a regular basis and attempting to purge most junk food from my life. The exercise part is going well, the food part…not so much. Which made this book a really enjoyable read for me since Mr. Jacobs delves so deeply into the eating aspect of being healthy.

Drop Dead Healthy chronicles Esquire writer A.J. Jacobs’ quest to live a more healthy life. Each chapter is about a certain body part (eyes, heart, lungs) or food/diet plan and he looks at both sides of the issues, the criticisms and the endorsements. There are chapters on sleeping better, eating less sugar, breathing better, and the proper way to care for one’s teeth. This is not a small book, but I whipped through it in two days, that’s how interesting it is.

Everyone can learn something from Drop Dead Healthy, so I suggest you pick it up today.

Fail

I'm going to talk about two books that I started recently and had to put down by the third chapter.

The Lifeboat
Charlotte Rogan
Fiction

This got rave reviews in several magazines I read, so I decided to pick it up. Then I read the first chapter, in which a newlywed woman discusses how she's on trial for her husband's murder. The next chapter backtracks to when this woman is on a lifeboat with other survivors of a ship crash (think Titanic) and navigating around bodies in the water and people screaming for help. I quickly decided this book was probably going to be a real downer and tossed it back on my stack. Next.

Walking on Dry Land
Denis Kehoe
Fiction

A book about a woman looking for her real mother. Sounds good, right? Well, I suppose the plot was okay, but the writing? OMG. I'd like to copy word for word a page out of this novel, but that would take way too much time so I'm just going to list the new and inventive ways the author came up with to replace the word said: Smiled (how does one "smile" something?), whistled (how can you whistle when you're talking?), interrupted, responded, replied, requested, proposed. I want to scream when I see this ish. I mean, come on, people. Just use said. What is wrong with said? After a page full of that crap, I couldn't keep going. I just couldn't.